Bargain Hunters Beware

T he replacement column . . .

Chris Miller is unprotect ed and available in today’s Carolina-Jacksonville expansion draft. Three million dollars says no one takes him.

* Steve Beuerlein, however, is expected to be selected, thus reducing the Arizona Cardinals’ options at quarterback to Jim McMahon, Jay Schroeder and direct long snaps to Garrison Hearst.

* The Cardinals also left Ricky Proehl unprotected. Proehl was the wide receiver who dropped a certain touchdown pass from Beuerlein in a season-opening 14-12 loss to the Rams, as you might remember. Evidently, Buddy Ryan did.

* Other Rams available today are Richard Buchanan, Howard Griffith, Tim Lester, Chris Martin and Gerald Robinson. Carolina attempted to phone the Rams for game film on each player, but the request was met with raucous laughter and, then, a dial tone.

* ESPN will devote two hours of live coverage to the draft and, yes, the hockey lockout is over.

* Assuming Miller is still a Ram by the end of the day, he will be reunited in mini-camp with his old college coach, Rich Brooks. Hold the Cold Duck, however. “Based on his injury situation and what happened last year,” Brooks says, “it would be premature to say who will be the quarterback next season. Chris Miller obviously is one guy we can look at right now as kind of the starter who’s coming back.” Note to Tommy Maddox: Keep loose.

* Brooks’ Oregon teams had a reputation for flinging the football around the yard, but last season, the Ducks ranked ninth in the Pac-10 in total offense and starting quarterback Danny O’Neil threw for just 2,212 yards.

* Those 61 passes in the Rose Bowl? Other guys score 38 points, these things will happen.

* The Ram hire ex-Cardinal running back Johnny Roland as an assistant coach and those PSLs in St. Louis go flying off the shelf.

* The NFL owners meet in Dallas this week to give the Rams’ move a look-see before voting on it next month. That’s “Look at the precedent St. Louis is setting with these sinfully profitable PSLs” and “See you later, Anaheim.”

* Alexei Zhitnik for Grant Fuhr? A 22-year-old defenseman with Paul Coffey potential for a 32-year-old backup goalie who becomes an unrestricted free agent at season’s end? Just what the Kings need. Another old guy who can’t put the puck in the net.

* Barry Melrose is calling it playoff insurance. What, the Kings get four points in three road games and are now convinced they’re Stanley Cup material?

* Sadly, that appears to be the case. This 48-game NHL schedule is messing with everybody’s mind--remember this one: “Ducks Aiming For Playoffs In ‘95”--and Melrose is now telling people, with a straight face, that the Kings can make a serious run in a short season with the right goaltending. A week ago, the Kings were 2-5-1 and Melrose was making a serious run at an exciting new career in broadcasting.

* Wayne Gretzky adds again to his Vintage Oiler Collection. If he has to have a hobby, why couldn’t it be stamps?

* Rumor: Gretzky would like to instruct Sam McMaster to trade Rob Blake and Darryl Sydor to the Rangers for Mark Messier, but then his set would be complete and what’s the fun in that?

* Meanwhile, back at The Pond, all is quiet on the trade front. Too quiet. The Ducks, 1-6 in their last seven, have yielded 448 shots in 12 games--a league-high average of 37.3 per game. In their last seven games, they have been outshot, 271-154. Call the Kings, Jack Ferreira. They’re giving defensemen away.

* Paul Kariya’s back injury has been diagnosed as merely a sprain and he’ll be ready to play just as soon as the other 19 Ducks climb off his shoulders.

* Crime and punishment, an Anglo-American comparison: Eric Cantona, aptly named striker for Manchester United of the English premier soccer league, climbs into the stands to kung fu kick a fan in the chest and immediately is suspended by his team for the rest of the season, with the league considering a lifetime ban. Vernon Maxwell, aptly named off-guard for the Houston Rockets, climbs into the stands to club a fan and is suspended for, what, a road trip?

* NBA Commissioner David Stern, on the defensive, notes that Maxwell’s 10-game suspension is “one of the harshest” the league has issued, while adding that “in all deference to our friends in soccer, I’m not going to take any lessons from them in decorum--either on the field or in the stands--about how the game should be conducted.”

* Fair enough, although at last week’s post-match riot between Chelsea and Millwall fans, one mounted policeman was overheard telling another, “This is nothing. You should have seen the Rockets and the Knicks in the NBA finals.”

* The best thing about the ESPY awards: Michael Bolton presented but did not sing.

* The worst thing about the ESPY awards: Richard Jeni’s attempt at stand-up comedy as mid-show filler. What, Charles Barkley wasn’t available?

* Scab . An abbreviation for See California Angel Baseball.

* Rich Brooks to the Rams as head coach. Bruce Rollinson to Oregon to replace Rich Brooks as head coach. You mean only one of them’s a hoax?